Performance Assessment of Urban Transit Priority Strategies:Case Study of Nanjing, China

摘要

The objective of this study is 2-fold: first, to provide an efficiency method to diagnose theperformance of Nanjing’s transit priority strategies (TPSs) during a long past-period; andsecond, to offer scientific suggestions to improve the service level of its urban transit. Byconsidering a variety of factors which influence the TPSs in the context of a complexpolitical structure in China, quantitative research has been conducted with reference to thematter-element theory in order to make scientific assessment. A combinational weightingmethod combining the subjective weighting method and the objective weighting method isadopted to calculate the weights of these factors. This paper uses comprehensive degree toexamine the performance of Nanjing’s TPSs from 2001 to 2010 and establishes arecommended evaluation criterion based on the comparative analysis of these ten years’comprehensive degrees. The recommended criterion provides references for Nanjing’sconsecutive performance assessment of the TPSs. The prominent analysis on the quantitativeresults offer scientific suggestions for Nanjing to improve its TPSs by implementing transitsignal priority strategies at intersections, scheduling different bus lines coordinately,providing more bus service information at bus stations and improving the dedicated bus lanesby combining transit signal priority strategies or updating them into intermittent bus lanes.Related analysis and suggestions may be advisable for Nanjing’s planners and managers toachieve better grades in the TPSs and improve the service level of Nanjing’s transit.